Red
by Xardogn
Summary: The color red permeates through the poison of Shinra. A small piece detailing the aftermath of the plate dropping on the slums.


All in all, the mission had been a success. The Avalanche threat had been all but eliminated and they had acquired the Ancient for Hojo and for leverage. Reno had dropped the plate on Sector 5 and the terrorist group had been blamed.

And yet the mission left a bad taste in Rude's mouth. Even if he wasn't present, his partner had been and he'd not seen a single sign of Reno after they had returned to headquarters. It was unusual for someone as excitable as the red-head, but ever since _that _event, Reno had never been quite the same.

Elena, it seemed, had the same idea. Rude turned towards her as she ran up to him.

"Rude, have you seen Reno around?" She asked. "I'm worried about him."

_You too? _

He merely shook his head slightly, intending to head back to their shared room to see if he could find his partner there.

"Oh…I thought he'd at least tell you where he went…" Elena looked down at the floor, clearly troubled. "I saw him come back from the mission. Something seemed off about him."

"I figured as much." Rude finally spoke, and the girl looked quickly up at him, a suspicious sheen in her eyes. He however, shook his head again.

"Can you go…check on him? I. I mean, I don't-" She shook her hands in front of herself helplessly, not meeting Rude's gaze. He held a gloved hand out, against hers, inclining his head slightly.

_I will go and see._

"Thank you Rude. And…you better not tell him I was worried about him!" She said furiously, the crack in her voice betraying her worry.

"I wouldn't dream of it." Sharp as ever, he turned on his heel and continued on his way, only sparing a single glance back at the younger Turk, who was standing dejectedly in the middle of the hallway.

* * *

He opened the door slowly. Rude was not prone to worry about many things, but his partner was someone he made an exception for. They had now been together for over four years, and it was only to be expected. That is why he was glad when he heard the water running in the bathroom and Reno's jacket sprawled along the couch.

Rude shut the door in an audible click to let Reno know he had entered, but the sounds from the bathroom continued. Deciding to give his partner some space for a minute, he cleaned up a few stray items around the apartment.

_What exactly is he doing?_

The water continued to flow from what sounded like the sink. How long exactly had that been going on? It did not sound particularly dangerous, but Rude went to check on it anyway. He'd given his partner enough warning.

The door was closed and he slowly creaked it open to find the red-head standing at the sink, his hands under the stream of the water.

_What…?_

Rude did not show many emotions on his face, but Reno had gotten far too good at reading him. However, right now, the younger man seemed to not even notice his presence, merely staring in the mirror away from him. His hands were moving under the unending stream of water, making motions as if to wash them, even if they were perfectly clean.

"Reno?" He spoke the single word, which seemed to echo around the bathroom. The red-head didn't respond again for a second, and then turned slowly towards him. It took years of self-control to not take a breath and step back from the look in his eyes.

They were dead.

Not just a blank stare, but truly, heartbreakingly dead. The famous mischievous spark that always existed in Reno's bright blue eyes was gone, as if all vitality had been drained from him.

"Rude." Even Reno's voice sounded strange and gasping. The Turk turned back to the sink and concentrated on his hands which he kept rubbing together under the water. Rude, in an unexpected turn, did not know what to do. He'd only once ever seen that look one other time on Reno's once-lively face. _That _time.

"Reno, what are you doing?" It seemed to him a reasonable question, though 'are you okay' probably would've been better. The answer to that however, was painfully obvious. Reno was not okay in any sense of the word.

There was nothing but the echoing sound of the sink faucet for a minute until Reno swallowed and finally answered.

"It won't come out." Reno stared down at his hands a minute, and then started scrubbing again, running his slender fingers together, desperately reaching for every crevice in his skin and the space under his nails.

"What won't?"

"The blood," he whispered with a voice as flat as his eyes. "I keep washing my hands, but the blood won't come out. It's not coming out."

_The blood._

_The blood of innocents we have slain in the name of Shinra. _

Rude's hand gripped the knob of the door tighter, for he did not have a response to that. Reno's red hair cascaded down his back, out of its normally orderly ponytail, and his shirt was unbuttoned. As worried for his partner's-no, his friend's-mental state as he was, Rude couldn't take his eyes off of him.

_You were just like that when Zack died, were you not? _

The other time he'd seen such dead eyes.

* * *

_"That's…his blood, isn't it?" Reno's fingers traced along the stained ground where they had arrived too late. "Oh Goddess, please tell me this isn't real…"_

_Rude could say nothing, as always. Years of training did not prepare him for moments like this. _

_Zack Fair. He almost reached his hand out to prevent Reno from running over to the body, an action he regretted forever. _

_They were Turks. It didn't do to show such emotion towards fallen comrades or enemies of the company. They were Turks. It was the words he and Tseng kept repeating to remind themselves they were not human and could not be touched. _

_By the time he had walked over to Reno, the boy was covered in blood and had the same scary dead look in his eyes. Five years had passed since the beginning of the crisis and yet Reno looked sixteen again. Eyes desperately searching Rude for an answer. Searching him for why he was such an impassible Turk despite everything. _

_"Why?" Reno's lips trembled as he asked that question. "This blood ain't gonna come out. Why?"_

_He had not forgotten that look._

_He had not forgotten Tseng throwing his phone across the room as the two partners reported their failure._

_He had not forgotten Reno desperately laughing as he tried to piece back together some semblance of an uncaring attitude. _

_"We gave up our right to human feelings when we became Turks, don't you remember that, Rude? Stop being so upset!" Reno had said to him, as if he had been the one to break down. _

_He was right. They were no longer human._

* * *

He could almost picture again the stain of Zack's blood on the red-head's fingers, the blood he was trying so desperately to wash out. It was the same color as Reno's fiery hair that he loved so much, and the marks that covered his body. His partner had always been so saturated with the color that it took a desperate measure to remember why his partner always despised it.

Red hair was something you were born with, but red blood is something you chose. Or so Reno had put it to him.

Rude reached over a hand and turned the faucet off in a swift motion. "That's enough. It's not going to come out."

Reno had rubbed his hands raw and red from the constant motion. How long he'd been at it, the taller man didn't know, but it would stop now.

The red-head turned towards him again, just a slight shine of anger back into the dead eyes, which Rude was secretly grateful for. It did not matter he was the target, as long as Reno did not have that expression anymore.

He slowly removed the gloves from his hands, an act that was hardly normal, but his partner did not react.

"We all have blood we cannot get out," He said simply, holding his hands out by Reno's. The blue eyes flicked down for a moment, before returning to his partner's face.

"I hate the color red."

This was not working.

_So something had died in him that day. _Rude had been afraid of that. Being his partner, he noticed far more about Reno then most of the other Turks. And after finding the body of the great SOLDIER on the cliffs behind Midgar, he had sensed something about Reno had been killed.

He had been deluding himself to think any differently, for their role was not to be human, but to be machines for the Shinra company. Why had he expected anything else? Why did he feel so upset when this was merely an 'asset' of their jobs?

Perhaps he had secretly hoped Reno's strange light would survive the poison of Shinra, as Zack's had seemed to. But it had died on that cliffside, carried on only by a small blonde boy who had no idea of the fate bestowed upon him.

Rude merely sighed and led Reno into the apartment, where he could at least sit down.

_How could I be such a fool? No light remains in Shinra. Only red._


End file.
